Scheduled Maintenance March 2026: Upgrading to SQL Server 2025

This upgrade is driven by Microsoft’s announcement that SQL Server Web Edition has been discontinued and is no longer available in the SQL Server 2025 release. To ensure our users have access to the most up-to-date features and security patches, we are migrating all users to the more robust Standard Edition. The change will also allow us to remove the requirement of only using shared hosting SQL Server databases with websites. 

Our testing has identified a significant performance change in how Classic ASP (ADO) interacts with the SQL Server 2025 engine.

The default ADO CursorType, adOpenForwardOnly (0), has been found to be significantly slower in this new environment. To prevent application latency and slow page loads, we strongly recommend that all Classic ASP developers update their Recordset Open methods to use adOpenStatic (3).

Old/Slow Implementation;

rsCommon.Open strSQL, adoCon, 0

New/Recommended Implementation;

rsCommon.Open strSQL, adoCon, 3

We recommend applying this change to your connection scripts prior to the maintenance window to ensure a seamless transition.

The upgrade is scheduled to take place during the following window:

During the maintenance window, SQL Server services will be restarted. You may experience brief intermittent connectivity issues for approximately 5 minutes while your database is migrated. Web services (IIS) will remain online, but database-driven pages may be temporarily unavailable during that time.